Oh, you thought I was talking about 1861. I was, however, invoking 1776, for what we like to call a revolution is more accurately described as a secession movement.
Life is not all politics, though. There is also baseball. Sometime in the early nineties, I think it was, baseballs started hopping out of ballparks at a rate unknown since joy first departed Mudville. Bill James wrote a piece at that time saying that there was something like a 99% chance that someone was going to break Hank Aaron's career home run mark.
James was surprised by the intensity of the negative reaction to his prediction. It was not just SABR geeks disputing his statistical methodology. James was hit with the angry and irrational denial of people who could not accept the possibility of Aaron's record being erased. This visceral response James attributed to a human propensity to be disturbed by the possibility of the loss of the familiar, even in something as trivial as a baseball record. What if something important and fundamental were to change? It is likely, James wrote, that sometime in the next 100 years part of the country will decide to secede, and whether this happens with travail and bloodshed will depend on how willing we are to countenance the prospect of secession.
Barry Bonds surges beyond Ruth, and I Pavlovially think about secession. The sentiment for secession could rise from several conditions:
(1) The country could cease to be a democracy. The expansion of police powers and the powers of the Executive, the rigging of elections, yes it is alarmist to say that democracy is vanishing until one day we realize it has vanished.
(2) The country, in full exercise of democracy, becomes a theocracy. This is not so far-fetched. The divide between the faith-based and reality-based communities is one of the driving forces in American politics. It will only get deeper. And for those who think that demography is destiny, just which side of the divide do you suppose has the higher birth rate?
(3) George W. Bush is worried about activist judges. Actually, so am I. An activist Roberts court could overturn all progressive legislation since 1930 (or 1880, take your pick). A few strategically reasoned Court cases could make the country unrecognizable. And no mere exercies of legislative will could change it back.
(4) OK, this is the right-wing nightmare, but it's relevant so I'll include it here. Unchecked immigration creates a linguistically Spanish-dominant Southwest, giving rise to the same sort of separatist tendencies as percolate as Quebec.
This is not to say that any of the conditions will come to pass. But we should admit that secession is not unthinkable, and try to come up with a mechanism by which states could leave the country. (I think the Quebec standard of 50% plus one in a single election is too secession-friendly; there should be a need for a super-majority or a vote that is confirmed by a second vote after a waiting period of a year or so.)
July 4th is but a couple weeks away. I wish you all a happy Secession Day.
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